


Through Sorrow Toward Trust

by who_needs_words



Series: short fics for TMA Gerry Week 2021 [1]
Category: The Magnus Archives (Podcast)
Genre: Adelard Dekker is a good man, Betrayal, Canon Compliant, Canon-Typical Violence, Eyes, Gen, Gerard Keay has shitty parental figures, Mary Keay's A+ Parenting, No beta we die like archival assistants, TMA Gerry Week 2021, my quest to give Gerry a good parental figure, sorry - Freeform, the major charcter death is Gerry
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-23
Updated: 2021-02-23
Packaged: 2021-03-13 11:33:55
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,103
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29650695
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/who_needs_words/pseuds/who_needs_words
Summary: Gerard Keay doesn't trust easily, he's been burned too many times. Yet he trusts Adelard Dekker.(Or; Gerry can have a decent parental figure, as a treat.)
Relationships: Adelard Dekker & Gerard Keay, Gerard Keay & Gertrude Robinson, Gerard Keay & Mary Keay
Series: short fics for TMA Gerry Week 2021 [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2178846
Comments: 1
Kudos: 20
Collections: TMA Gerry Week 2021





	Through Sorrow Toward Trust

**Author's Note:**

> This is for the first day of TMA Gerry Week. The prompts for Monday were "Ink/Trust/Linger"
> 
> I've got an hour till midnight, so it's still Monday (in my timezone at least).

Gerard Keay doesn’t trust Gertrude Robinson. 

There are a million and one reasons not to. Starting with the mysterious death of all her previous assistants and ending with the plastic explosives he Knows she keeps stored somewhere. But those Gerry can ignore, did ignore most days. It wasn't his place to ask those questions. Every question he asked, every time curiosity burned through him, he lost himself little by little to the Eye. They had a deal, he and the Eye. But everything Gerry fed it he danced closer and closer to that line he could never allow himself to cross. 

So Gerry never asked, but he also never trusted. 

It was her Eyes, Gerry decided. For all she claimed to be different Gertrude had his mother’s eyes. For perhaps it was the other way around. Maybe his mother had Gertrude’s eyes. 

Of course the eyes themselves weren’t what was so jarringly similar. Gertrude’s were a warm brown that edged close to amber. Gerry put it down to her connection to the Lightless Messiah. Meanwhile his mother had ice blue eyes almost as cold as her heart. Gertrude had crinkles from years of smiles. Not true smiles of course, but she wore the sweet little smile of a sweet little grandmother like a circus performer wore faces. 

So they were very different eyes. But also far, far too similar. Both were hard and looked at Gerry like he was a tool. Something to be used in accomplishing their goals.

So no, Gerry never trusted Gertrude. That didn’t stop the hurt from burning through him when she betrayed him. He would have wept if he had been able to, in the thrice-damned hell of not-life he had found himself in. Dead, but not dead, oceans away from his home. 

Gertude had betrayed him, and all Gerry could think was it didn’t matter that he’d never trusted her. She had still used him like a favorite weapon. Wielded him like she would a gun or Compulsion. 

Her betrayal burrowed deep into his torn and tattered soul. Because he had given her so many things. In the end he’d even given her his life. 

There was someone he had trusted- Adelard. 

Gertrude Robinson had not been responsible for Gerry meeting Adelard Dekker. He’d met the man while digging into his father, desperate to find some connection to the man he had never even had the chance to know. 

He’d discovered quite a lot about Eric Delano; that he’d worked at the Magnus Institute as one of Gertrude Robinson's assistants. (Long before he had met the women, yet Gerry had Known her). 

He’d dug into his father’s history the same was he would into research. Finding out all he could. It consumed his every minute, all his thoughts had gone toward it. He had no plans to venture into the Magnus Institute- he knew what lurked there. His mother had snarled about the Institute enough times for Gerry to put the pieces together.

But there were other names, Salesa, Lukas, Dekker. Gerry was no fool, he would never go near a Lukas. As for Salesa, approaching that man would be only slightly less foolish. But Dekker. Adelard Deker, there Gerry found potential. (Not just for information, but also the possibility of an ally).

\---

Gerry starred at the small house before him. It looked far too quaint and domestic to be the home of a notorious avatar killer. (Not a Hunter, of that Gerry had checked, double checked and tripled checked. He would rather venture into the Magnus Institute than face a Hunter). Still facades were often very deceiving. 

Gerry approached the door, when nothing sinister happened he raised his hand and knocked. After barely a moment and no noise a face appeared in the eye hole and a voice echoed out to him. 

“And who are you?” His voice sounded normal enough, solid and steady. No reason as of yet to flee. 

“Gerard Keay. I’m here to-” before Gerry could finish the voice cut him off. 

“Keay? Leave here and tell your mother I wouldn't deal with her.” The eye vanished. Gerry felt anger flicker through him, of course. He couldn’t even have this. He glared at the door, considering all the words he could unleash.

Instead he knocked again. Just as before no footsteps foretold Dekker’s movement, yet his voice echoed again. 

“Leave little Keay.” He called out, this time his voice was underlined in steel. 

“I’m not here on my mother's behalf!” Gerry called out. “You knew my father, Eric Delano.” When nothing happened Gerry cautiously offered “I just want to talk.”

“You aren’t a Watcher are you?” Dekker asked. Gerry breathed a sigh of relief, maybe Dekker would let him in, or at least come out. 

“No.” Gerry answered. Years later he would reflect on the half-truth, half-lie nature of that answer. At the time he was an angry, curious thing. Not yet beholden to anything. Unfortunately that neutrality wouldn’t last long. 

The door crept open and Gerry got his first look at Adelard Dekker. He was a tall, solidly built black man with a face set in perfect neutrality. His eyes- those Gerry noticed most though. They were caring. Hard? Yes. But caring. They looked at Gerry, all of seventeen and a walking mess dressed in ragged rebellion and _saw_ him. Not as watcher would, or his mother did. But as a person. 

“Well come in,” Dekker said.

\---

Gerry would return to Adelard many times over the coming years. Adelard was getting on in years, and while his mind remained as sharp as it always had his body showed the wear of his lifestyle. Gerry, young and smart was the perfect help. Adelard never had to explain anything, but he never kept anything from Gerry either. (So very like his father, accepting someone just because they tell truths. Yet Gerry never trusted those who would use him.)

For all Adelard asked for help, in research, in tracking and dealing with whatever thrice-cursed villain of the month was he never threw Gerry into danger. They shared it. And for all Gerry may have been young and inexperienced, he listened to Gerry’s thoughts and ideas.

Gerry trusted Adelard. In a way he never had before, and never would again while his heart beat.

(He would end up trusting a Beholder again. Just not in life. For all Gertrude had betrayed him her replacement had eyes very much like Adelard’s. Worn and beaten but bright with too much heart. Gerry had opened his mouth and told the Archivist a thousand secrets. And it hadn’t tasted bitter.)

**Author's Note:**

> Fun fact; no spell checker likes Adelard's name. Or the last name Keay. 
> 
> This fic emerged from my desire to give Gerry some kind of decent parental figure. Plus I think Gerry and Adelard probably got along really well. 
> 
> If you see any spelling/grammar errors just let me know.


End file.
